Contents

History

Background

Don Carmine Cuneo.

Leo Cuneo.

The Cuneo family was founded by Ottilio Cuneo and started as a bootlegging operation ran out of The Bronx and upstate New York in the 1920s. Their front company was a fleet of milk trucks that delivered across the city, which earned their Don the nickname of 'The Milkman'.
He consolidation was in the 1934, with the Five Families and Commission's foundation

The Cuneo family had businesses in New York City mostly in Manhattan and The Bronx.
However, it was also active in Upstate New York, mainly Buffalo. In this area it run for all gambling and bookmaking operations and exercised veto power on state licensing of racing tracks, but also arranged smuggling of Italian immigrants from Canada.
The Cuneo was also active in New Jersey.

at the end of 1930s, the Cuneos were involved in the narcotics distribution in all NYC, along the Barzini, Stracci and Tattaglia crime families, but not the Corleone crime family, thta refused the drug business until 1948.

In the novel

Cuneo was present at the wedding of Sonny Corleone, where he danced with his wife and young daughter.

However, the Cuneo family was very important during the Five Families War against the Corleone crime family (1946-1948) for the drug trafficking's legitimation, when its played a very important role for its strategic power and the resistance for the attacks by the rivals. Shortly after Sollozzo's murder, some Cuneo's hitmen killed two top soldier of the Corleone family in Greenwich Village, during a meal.
Ottilio Cuneo was present during the 1948 Mafia meeting for conclude the war, where he made it a point that the future drug business would not involve children in any way.

In 1963, Ottilio Cuneo organized a meeting with the other families of the Commission for debate of the Michael Corleone's retire, but the authorities do a barge in the meeting, that brought to the arrest of various bosses, cripple the Don Cuneo's legitimate figure and discovered his criminal interests. After the meeting, Ottilio was imprisoned for conspiracy and deceased in prison.

In 1955, Don Cuneo himself was visiting one of his hotels, the Tesla Hotel. However, as he was leaving the building, Cuneo was trapped in the revolving door and killed by Corleone soldatoWillie Cicci.

Cuneo was replaced as head of the family by Leo Cuneo.
During Leo Cuneo's reign the Cuneo family invested heavily in hotels and casinos in Las Vegas, particulary those that were owned by the Corleone family, making Cuneo a multi-millionaire. But his fortune was shortly, becaus Leo was murdered in 1979, during the Atlantic City Massacre.

Influences

The Cuneo crime family could be based on the Lucchese and Magaddino crime families.
As the Lucchese crime family, the Cuneo family is distant from the general public and the authorities' radar, and it's mainly active in The Bronx and New Jersey, historical Lucchese territories.
As the Magaddino from Buffalo, which also ran upstate New York and had close ties to the New York families and its is the responsable of the 1963 Mafia meeting (inspired by Apalachin meeting of 1957) that was the cause of the arrests of various bosses of the Mafia.
Also, Ottilio/Carmine Cuneo is inspired by Tommaso "Tommy" Gagliano and Stefano "The Undertaker" Magaddino, because he was born in 1883 (Gagliano was born in 1884) and was the third boss of NYC in 1940s and was very active in Buffalo and Upstate New York (as Magaddino, that controlled the gambling operation this area).